Sitter in 37 portraitsAmerican-born politician; Astor came to England in 1904 and married her second husband Waldorf Astor, whom she succeeded as Conservative MP for the Sutton division of Plymouth in 1919. A champion of women's rights, she was the first woman MP to sit in the House of Commons (1919-45). Despite playing a large part in drawing the Conservative Party's attention towards the need to attract the female electorate, Astor was repeatedly overlooked for a position in Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin's cabinet, and an attempt in 1929 to form a women's party with a number of female Labour politicians was unsuccessful, but she continued to hold her Plymouth seat for a further fifteen years.

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